Billboard To Launch Digital Music Blog

“Billboard PostPlay” Launches from Digital Music Forum

New York, NY (March 3, 2005) Billboard, the world’s most trusted source of music and entertainment news, charts and reviews takes a leap into the blogosphere with the launch of Billboard PostPlay, a blog covering the latest news, trends, analysis and economics of the digital music industry. Accessible through a link at Billboard.biz or directly at BillboardPostPlay.com, the blog is a partnership with paidContent.org and will be directed by Rafat Ali, editor of the popular and influential blog.

The site will aggregate links to stories across the web pertaining to digital music along with commentary and analysis by Ali and his editorial team, creating a daily must-read site for the industry. Additional site content will be user generated, as readers will be able to comment on stories and provide links to additional relevant articles. As a convenient research feature, the archives will be collected by subject, company and category, as well as by calendar date.

“With the digital music scene ever-evolving, a trusted blog was the only real way to keep up with the pace of change. And as a fan of Rafat and paid Content, working with them was the obvious choice.” stated John Kilcullen, President and Publisher of Billboard. “The digital music community already looks to Billboard for news, reviews and analysis and our charts power most of the download music commerce sites. Billboard PostPlay is a dynamic extension of that relationship with the industry and provides a unique resource unlike any other on the web.”

The site goes live today with Ali posting live from the 5th annual Digital Music Forum, the annual conference hosted by Digital Media Wire and sponsored by Billboard.

PaidContent.org joins Billboard’s many other strategic partners, including Fox-TV, Microsoft, Reuters, Sirius Satellite Radio, Telemundo, Univision Radio, ABC Radio Networks, Azteca America and Billboard sister companies Nielsen SoundScan and Nielsen Broadcast Data Systems. These partnerships leverage Billboard’s proprietary data, charts and information resources to develop broadcast entertainment, digital and mobile platforms and contextual commerce applications that expand Billboard’s franchise and consumer reach.

About Billboard
Now in its 111th year, Billboard is the world’s premier music publication and a diverse digital, events and brand-licensing platform. Billboard publishes the most trusted charts and offers unrivaled reporting about the latest music, video and digital entertainment issues and trends. Billboard is the flagship property for the Billboard Information Group, which also consists of Billboard.biz, Billboard.com, Entertainment Law Weekly, Billboard Chart Alert, Billboard Information Network (BIN), Billboard Directories, Billboard Licensing & Events and Billboard Radio Monitor. Billboard is headquartered in New York with bureaus in Boston, London, Los Angeles, Miami, Nashville and Washington DC. The Group is a unit of VNU Business Media, a worldwide media company that provides specialized publications, electronically delivered data, expositions and marketing services and is owned by VNU Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Netherlands-based VNU, an international publishing and information company.

About paidContent.org
PaidContent is an award-winning website and property of ContentNext, an independent media and information company covering the business of digital media. ContentNext focuses on the digital sectors where media and entertainment companies operate: online, wireless, desktop, and off-desktop applications, products and services. Our mission is to help define sustainable business models and advance innovation within this sector. ContentNext also operates another award-winning site, MocoNews.net, which covers the mobile content sector.